Along the shores of one of Canada’s Great Lakes, Altaf Arain is unlocking crucial insights about how different types of forests and agricultural crops absorb and release carbon dioxide.  

Every half-hour, towers at the Turkey Point Environmental Observatory on Lake Erie have been collecting data that guide climate research worldwide.  

 “The goal is to see how much carbon can be absorbed or stored in these terrestrial ecosystems, so that we can offset greenhouse gas emissions,” said Arain, a professor in the School of Earth, Environment & Society. “This provides us with nature-based climate solutions, and it will help us with net zero emission goals.”  

This long-term data, which is extremely unique, also informs Canada’s climate policy. Dean of Science Gillian Goward calls the Turkey Point sites a “living library of ecological history.” 

The Turkey Point Environmental Observatory is made up of five flux towers, 5 to 34m tall, equipped with specialized fast-response (20Hz sampling) sensors and weather stations that measure the continuous exchange of carbon dioxide, water vapor, and energy fluxes as well as weather and soil variables between the Earth’s surface and atmosphere.  

The towers are in relatively close proximity, so they experience the same climate conditions; but each tower’s setting varies by age of forest, and species – with both deciduous and coniferous forests. Another tower is located at an agricultural site studying different crops such as corn, sweet potato, and tobacco, while another urban tower operates at the McMaster Carbon Sink Forest site near McMaster campus in Ancaster, Hamilton. The urban flux tower was added in 2025 and serves as a Urban Environmental Research and Experiential Learning Station. “With the majority of Canadians living in cities, urban areas had been a missing link in this research program and in Canadian carbon flux science,” said Arain. “With the addition of the urban flux station,  we’re now studying all major land cover types in the Great Lakes region. ” 

That long-term data set that the Turkey Point towers have produced is extremely unique – and puts them among the top 10 flux stations in the world, Arain said.  

But why collect that data?

With it, Arain can determine the carbon uptake in different ages and species of forests, and figure out which ones are most resilient in changing environmental conditions. 

It’s a particularly pressing question in the Great Lakes region; an area that’s home to 35 per cent of Canada’s population and generates 38 to 39 per cent of Canada’s GDP.  

“It’s a highly urbanized and industrialized region,” Arain said. “The local environment and ecosystems in the region are heavily impacted by human activity and intensive land use.”  

In some areas, there’s been an effort to restore the land, with the creation of more planted and managed forests in the last few decades. His team discovered that these forests, new though they may be, were acting as effective carbon sinks for not just the Great Lakes region, but the whole of eastern North America.  

A carbon sink is any natural or artificial system that absorbs more carbon dioxide from the air than it gives off – helping to lower the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and slowing down global warming.  

“They are a major carbon sink because of the growth of the forest that is coming back,” Arain said. “The land is being restored to the original ecosystem. So, we’re looking at how land restoration, specifically the forest ecosystem of different ages and different species, may contribute to offset carbon emissions in this area.”  Arain’s group is also studying responses of watersheds in changing climate change and exploring how land restoration and forest management practices may impact their water balances and streamflow.    

Figuring out which makeup of forest and management method is the best carbon sink is one piece of the puzzle. Another is to figure out how these forests are going to be impacted by climate change and extreme weather events in the future – and what impact the forests themselves will have.  

His research program draws on multiple disciplines and research methods: in addition to the flux towers, his research program also uses ground-based study – like sapflow systems to study water uptake by trees and soil chambers that measures CO2 leaving soil – and traditional biometric and airborne methods – like drone and satellite remote sensing. His team is exploring different facets of ecosystem restoration and environmental sustainability. That includes carbon sequestration capabilities, water use and sensitivity, resilience of managed forests and crops to future climate change and extreme weather events.  

Reach of work

Data from the Turkey Point Environmental Observatory is publicly accessible and shared with the global community through the Global Water Futures Program, Global Centre for Climate Change and Transboundary Waters, CanFlux, AmeriFlux and Global Fluxnet, making the Turkey Point data an invaluable part of an international knowledge base. 

Along with being utilized by hundreds of researchers worldwide, their work has been used to inform Canadian climate policy. 

Altaf’s research team works with all three levels of government as well as community groups: including Natural Resources Canada, Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC), the provincial Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry, Long Point Conservation Authority and St. Williams Conservation Reserve Community Council.  

For conservation authorities, cities and users, having access to hydrological simulations at catchment scales not only can tell them how flooding and water level changes will impact them but also help them prepare for future climate risks and implement appropriate adaptation measures,  Arain said. 

Nationally, their work has been used to inform Canada’s own climate policy – with their data used by ECCC for the Canadian Land Surface Scheme Including Biogeochemical Cycles (CLASSIC), a climate model that looks at the physical exchanges of heat, carbon and water between land surface and the atmosphere and examines the effects of vegetation, soil and snow cover.  

This is a major component of the Canadian Earth System Model – which models the  climate across Canada and the globe, to predict changes from seasonal to centennial timescales and for the United Nation’s’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change climate assessment reports.  

The knowledge from Turkey Point Environmental Observatory has been widely used for synthesis studies and cited hundreds of times in research papers. Arain’s team also has numerous joint publications with international researchers.  

“It’s not only for flux studies,” Arain said. “Our data is used for biogeochemical and hydrologic modelling studies, economic assessments, remote sensing studies, validation of satellite data projects and most importantly for education and community outreach … There’s a wide variety of uses of these data and modelling work.”  

Guiding long-term sustainability

In Arain’s lab, his students – which include undergraduates, research assistants, master’s and PhD students, and postdocs – are using the Turkey Point Observatory data, including the Urban Flux station in a myriad of ways to examine the impact of climate change, and better guide efforts around long-term sustainability and climate adaptation.  

There’s a field team, which sets up the systems at Turkey Point, monitors them, and analyzes the results. And there’s a modelling team, which uses advanced methods  to discern patterns and trends that help predict future climate change.  

Tariq Deen, a postdoctoral fellow in Arain’s lab, is focusing on the future effects of climate change at the watershed level.  

He looks at how different warming scenarios would affect hydrological and carbon dynamics in watersheds in the Great Lakes basin, by using a model that simulates these scenarios.  

Deen uses carbon, water and energy flux and weather data that’s gathered from Turkey Point to directly test and validate the model, in order to ensure it’s best representing the natural environment.  

“We hope that with the projections that we make, it can help inform future land management and water resource management,” Deen said. “And help guide future climate adaptation initiatives for the Great Lakes and for Canada.”  

Nature-based solutions

On the ground, PhD student Noah Stegman is using the Turkey Point sites to study forests and ecosystem management.  

In the planted forests at Turkey Point, Stegman installs sapflow sensors – probes that are drilled into the tree and which can measure how fast water moves up the tree. It allows them to know how much water the tree is using, while also capturing atmospheric CO2 sequestration through photosynthesis.  

Using the sapflow sensors, he’s studying two sites where a red pine planted forest was thinned (partially harvested) in 2014 in different patterns. “We’re trying to see which forest management method is leading to the most forest growth and carbon uptake, from a restoration purpose,” Stegman said. That includes looking how the understory has regenerated since thinning, which method produced the most diversity and growth, and which thinning method is using more water. “That can kind of be correlated to which trees are growing faster or better in storing carbon under those thinning conditions.”  

He’s also looking at how water use changes between tree species over different years, and with different weather events, to determine which ones might be more drought tolerant, and which might prefer wetter conditions. “If the climate of the area is moving in one direction or the other, if you’re having really dry or wet weather, or intermittent periods of both, which species is most likely going to be better adapted to these conditions?”  

It could have implications for forestry, restoration, and land management. “The goal is obviously more diversity at these sites as they’re kind of being transitioned from [planted forest] to natural ecosystems,” Stegman said. “So seeing which method is going to get there faster.”  

Arain’s lab continues to collect data and find nature-based solutions to climate problems. As we transition to more sustainable energy sources and adopt the technology to mitigate the environmental costs of carbon emissions, Arain remains optimistic. 

“The technology is there,” he said. And the future generation, in particular, is well-informed and cares deeply about the environment.  “People can make a difference.”